Why Are The Mets So Bad At Handling Injuries?

This team when it comes to handling injuries is just horrible. We saw it last year with Ryan Church’s concussion in Atlanta. The Mets gave him a game off, flew him to Colorado and had him playing while suffering a concussion. It was a major setback to the season as Church was not the same player when he came back after finally being put on the disabled list.

This year in Spring Training there were conflicting reports on Johan Santana’s elbow from the manager, pitching coach and GM. Thankfully for us and the Mets nothing was seriously wrong and Santana’s on fire. Carlos Delgado’s hip injury was horribly mishandled. For about 2 weeks he was sitting on the bench and playing while in pain. He was running bases as hard as he could even though he had an injury that required surgery on the hip. Just think about that for a moment. The Mets put Delgado on the disabled list two weeks earlier, he get the surgery on the hip and he returns sooner. Right now he’s slated to return in August but I don’t have much faith in what the Mets say about injuries. If Delgado does return this year it most likely won’t be until September. August might have been possible if the Mets had done the right and sensible thing in the first place and put Delgado on the DL.

Jose Reyes’ injury was mishandled this past 2 weeks as well. The Mets said it would be a 2 day injury. They tried to rush Jose back during the Dodgers series but he was out of the one game he played by the 3rd inning. He hasn’t played since. Reyes himself has said he’s felt no improvement in the calf after running for the last week but the Mets until about 4:30PM today (Tuesday) finally put Reyes on the DL.

What I don’t understand is why this team refuses to admit guys are hurt and the severity of their injuries? I also am befuddled by the Mets not wanting to put their players on the DL and have them go out and injure themselves more. We saw that with Church last year, Delgado this year and it looks like Jose Reyes as well. All these guys who are injured and not going to the DL also limits your bench. It does not make any sense to me. I don’t know if it’s the training staff or Omar Minaya who refuses to be upfront about these injuries, but this does need to change.